Experiments will explore how gravity influences the way the Universe
looks and behaves. The experiments will contribute to a deeper understanding of the beginning, development,
and fate of the universe, and may even discover long-range forces beyond those currently known.
GRP experiments might also lead to the long-sought unification of physical laws, revealing a powerful
order at the heart of the Universe.

Our ability to understand and to manipulate nature depends on the precision of our
measurements. Experiments in laser cooling and atomic physics will provide unprecedented accuracy,
setting new world standards for use in testing physical theories and in computing, navigation,
and communications here on Earth. Cooling atoms with lasers away from the Earth's gravity will
also give scientists better opportunities to measure fundamental atomic forces and symmetries that
may well hold clues to how things work at macroscopic levels as well.

Experiments in this area can reveal how organizing principles result from basic laws.
They will show how adding stress (i.e., heating or cooling) to uniform systems will produce
variations in which identifiable patterns can emerge. Studying states of matter (e.g., solid,
liquid, gas) and the transition from one phase to another will help us understand how similar
changes might have occurred in the early Universe, as well as improve such human activities
as weather modeling, metallurgy, and oil field recoveries.

Biological physics is the study of physical interactions in biology. How does the structure of a molecule
influence where it can attach to more complex structures? How do biological systems move? What signals are
passed between receptors and targets as they locate binding points? Can we form new devices from biological
elements, taking advantage of the speed or signal exchanges that occur in these systems? Nature has many
examples where biological systems convert energy from one form to another, say from chemical energy to
mechanical energy. This sub-discipline will use the tools, ideas, and methods of physics to probe biological
systems and will learn the physical laws that apply to these systems. The interface between physics and
biology will provide models for developing sensors and other devices.